Just Your Everyday, Run-of-the-Mill Apocalyptic Shamanic Breathwork Journey, Part Two...

In my previous entry, "Just Your Everyday, Run-of-the-Mill Apocalyptic Shamanic Breathwork Journey, Part One...", I laid out a little background on this entry. In one way, I've been a little fearful about writing this down and speaking publicly into my breathwork vision experience. As I said, it's a dilly...

I don't personally know anyone who isn't shocked and dismayed about what's happening in the Gulf and the very real sense that it is a tipping point of some sort. If it isn't at least a tipping point in waking people up to what we are doing to ourselves, then there seems very little hope that anything will wake us up.

As I prepared for my breathwork journey, the news around the spill grew worse. It turns out there are three leaks from the well, not one, and two of them are from casing failure and damaged strata far below the ocean floor: Scientists are now saying the amount of oil leaking in the gulf could be 3-4 times more than admitted by BP or the US Government; Tremendous amounts of methane gas is being released along with the oil, which has the very real possibility of creating huge "dead zones" in the gulf, and spreading who knows where. Last,  because of the "doomsday scenario," they can't shut the well down because of pressure buildup and the danger of underground blowouts in the rock formation. There are more disasters waiting.

What does it all mean? We don't know. Uncharted territory.

In an earlier breathwork vision several years ago, I was shown planets all over the universe who were not able to move in into higher awareness that had literally killed themselves off, and was told by "Spirit" that we had very little time to shift. If we didn't, our fate would resemble the other planets who had committed species suicide.

In this new breathwork, which happened just last week, I was "shown" that we have exceeded the tipping point where we had an opportunity to save ourselves: that we have passed the last opportunity to salvage our existence on the planet. At first, I was overcome with grief around our stupidity, then I tried to get out of the vision, looking for some way to escape, some way out of the vision that was being presented to me.

I couldn't.

Then, finally, surrender. I just let go. I still carried the numbness from the vision, but rested in surrender until the music finally took me out of the process. I then created a mandala (the illustration at the top of this entry) of what the planet might look like should the "doomsday scenario" take place. For the rest of the day and early evening, I was literally in shock.

It wasn't until later that evening that I was able to find some resolution around the vision: I had to "shift my perspective," stand in another place and view it from a different angle. What I found was this:

What if the shift so many of us have been working and preparing for doesn't look anything like we've imagined it? Existing stages of consciousness never really know what the newly emerging stage is going to look like. What would the effect be on the universe if 6.8 billion souls were pretty much dumped into the sixth "Bardo" at the same time? Sometimes referred to as the "store-house" consciousness, or the aggregate of consciousness which administers and yields rebirth, what impact might that have on consciousness itself? What impact might that have on the shamanic consciousness of death and rebirth?

From this point of view it is because the store-house consciousness, while being originally immaculate in itself, contains a "mysterious mixture of purity and defilement, good and evil" that the transformation of consciousness can take place and enlightenment can be experienced. In this analysis, mental and physical manifestations are nothing but discriminations of Mind and all aspects of the first seven physically enumerated consciousnesses are just the reflections of the store consciousness.

Maybe this is the shift, and maybe we are the ones we've been waiting for. Maybe it won't look anything like what we thought it would look like. Maybe we need to move out of this "little picture" consciousness, walk over here a few paces and look at it from a new perspective....

Hey, I don't know. What I do know is what we're doing isn't working on so many levels.

Partial image of mandala image by Gary Stamper

Enjoy Every Sandwich: An Account of a Personal Shamanic Journey Through Breathwork

This is the very personal and courageous story of one man's journey through a day long Shamanic Breathwork that recently took place here in Seattle with our Shamanic Breathwork Group, which meets approximately once a month. I offer it here with the author's permission with no comment, except for this powerful process, and the journeyer, who asked not to be identified, to speak for itself. - Gary

10-13-2007:

Today I attended a shamanic breathwork workshop at Gary Stamper’s house, facilitated by Jeff Burger. The first thing Jeff did as we were gathering for the workshop was to invite each of us to pick a tarot card from where he had them spread out in a circle. One card was directly in front of me, a corner pointing directly at me, so I picked it – The Knight of Wands. This was from the Crowley Tarot and the knight was on a horse rampant, facing left. His cloak spread out behind the horse to where it looked like flames under and behind the horse. In his left hand he was thrusting forward with a wand that was a burning firebrand.

Jeff had a way of explaining the Tarot that was so much more clear and intelligible than anything I’ve read and I wish I could remember everything he said about the Knight of Wands. What I do remember: The wands are creative, masculine, fire energy and the knight of wands is the manifestation of the mature masculine. He has come through the fire and is now able to take that creative fire energy out into the world and wield it for good – or something to that effect. This spoke to me of wisdom, skillful means and the ability to manifest my passion in the "real world" in a creative and meaningful way and I said, “Well that’s certainly where I’d like to be!”

The breathwork technique is pretty simply, deep, belly breathing at a slightly rapid rate that induces a bit of hyperventilation. I started out breathing deeply and felt my hands starting to tingle and sweat. At some point I was working at it and thought, “this is too much work, why is nothing happening?” At that thought I backed off and just went on breathing more normally. This did not produce any “results” so I started breathing deeply again thinking, “I’m not quitting, I’m not giving up on this.” I kept going but still nothing was happening and I began feeling a little disappointment. I remember thinking that if nothing happened I certainly would not be coming back for any more of these workshops. I backed off yet again and started breathing more normally, then gathered my resolve once more and began breathing the technique again.

As I kept up the breathing I started feeling really hungry, to the point of distraction, and had a vision of the pastrami on rye sandwich I’d brought for my lunch. I became completely preoccupied with this and found myself wishing this whole thing were done so that I could eat my sandwich. I felt frustration that I was preoccupied with eating lunch and then it struck me as really odd that I had come here for this experience and the only thing I wanted was to quit and go eat my pastrami on rye sandwich.

At that point my hands were getting numb and were cramping from the hyperventilation. This didn’t bother me as I knew what it was and I knew it would go away on its own. I had a sense that I was experiencing the torticollis in my hands rather than in my neck and I was able to kind of “play” with this feeling. I realized at that moment that my neck was not bothering me at all, it had transitioned to my hands, and I felt tickled by this, I chuckled just a bit. The sandwich was still in my mind however and I began to see a dark tunnel before my vision, the shamanic tunnel to the underworld, but there was this giant, luminous pastrami on rye sandwich hovering just inside the entrance to the tunnel. This again struck me as both odd, and frustrating. I knew without a doubt that I was on the very verge of slipping into the altered state of consciousness and launching into the shamanic journey I had come here fore, but I was still preoccupied with this damned pastrami on rye sandwich. And then something switched on in my mind and I realized I was “there.” I wasn’t distracted by the pastrami on rye, the pastrami on rye was the message – or more precisely, the symbol of the message, and I suddenly had this expansive sense of both the grand humor and comedic irony of life. I began to laugh. I laughed and laughed, a deep belly laugh. And that part of me in the back of my mind that stayed conscious realized that this was the trigger and I was now fully into the journey.

Then as I was laughing, still seeing this pastrami on rye sandwich hovering within the tunnel to the underworld, the words came to me; “Eat every sandwich,” and I instantly had this sense of both grief and admiration for Warren Zevon and all of those who, like him, had died a heroic death;* that, and by implication the loss of all loved ones, and shining stars; but also of the loss of life one experiences, and more precisely that I have experienced, when we go through life not “eating every sandwich,” not living life fully. And then I began to cry. I cried for a long time, cried deeply, and that kind of general, all inclusive grief turned to very specific grief for the loss of my Dad twenty years ago now, and I began crying even deeper. I remember feeling like I was reaching into the tunnel, which was still present, like I was trying to reach across the threshold and embrace my Dad. Pull him back. I kept half sobbing his name, but I was still self-conscious enough not to do so completely out loud (unfortunately)

There was a profound sense of the loss of my Dad and a feeling of, “I’m not ready for this.” I’m not ready for dad to be gone, I’m not ready for the responsibility, I’m not ready to be a man, I’m not ready to be a father, a husband, a (profession deleted), etc., etc. And there was a sense of having never fully lived up to all of these responsibilities because of my lack of ability to “Enjoy every sandwich” to be fully present and comfortable in my own skin at any given moment in time. And I cried for a long time, and even when the crying was done and I lay there relaxed and spent, I still dwelt in this space and kept these things in mind. This was a gift. I remembered what Mac Hall had told me in preparation for the Native American Church ceremony he had invited me too so many years ago, “At some point during the night the medicine [Peyote] will speak to you” – and he was right. Here I felt the same thing; The medicine had spoken to me, given me a gift. The gift was the message, certainly, but more profoundly, it was the experiencing of having, for the very first time in my life, reached down and touched that place of deep grief which I have known for long that I must open up, but have never known how to get there.

Hmmm, I wonder what would have transpired if I hadn’t stopped into the Safeway in the morning and bought that Pastrami on rye.

* I recalled the quote here as “Eat every sandwich”, but the actual quote was “Enjoy every sandwich.” This was Warren Zevon’s response when David Letterman asked him what advice he had for folks as he, Zevon, was facing immanent death from terminal cancer. “Enjoy every sandwich” was Zevon’s irreverent way of saying live life fully so that there will be no reason for regret at the end. Despite my “misquote” during the breathwork, it was the meaning of the quote that affected me regardless.

After not having visited a doctor in 20 years, Zevon was diagnosed with inoperable mesothelioma in 2002. Rather than wallow in self pity, Zevon boldly took responsibility for the hard “rock and roll” life he had lived; booze, drugs, smoking, etc., and accepted his impending death openly. Zevon chose to eschew treatment for the cancer so that he could record a final album with many of his friends; knowing all the while that the treatment may have extended his life, but would otherwise be incapacitating and would have negatively affected his ability to complete his final project. On September 7th, 2003, Warren Zevon died in his sleep shortly after laying down to take a nap. I had been a fan of Zevon’s work for many years and the manner in which he faced his death is a great inspiration to me and makes him, in my eyes, a giant among men – a true hero.

Shamanic Breathwork(TM) Process Revisited

Regular readers will remember my earlier blog on why I believe Shamanic Breathwork (TM) is an Integral Process. In fact, in my opinion, it's one the best Integral practices out there.

Today, in Seattle, we held the third regular meeting of the newly-formed SeattleIntegral Shamanic Breathwork(TM) group. We had six men and two women participating in this powerful process.

Since what happens in Las Vegas stays in Las Vegas (and confidential breathwork groups, as well), I can only tell you about my experience.

Led by the skilled SBW facilitator Jeff Berger, who is also a transpersonal Psychiatrist, we dived deep into our individual subconscious minds, producing breakthroughs and realizations that would usually take six months of therapy to uncover. That's one of the beauties of SBW: It's ability to bring up exactly what needs to come up, whether we recognize it or not.

This is my 10th breathwork, and while no expert, I'm not new to it, either. Each experience has been different for me. Today, as I began the controlled breath process and to the loud music designed to touch all of the energy fields of the body, the acid trip-like qualities of the breathwork began to kick in.....It took a while, and I soon realized I needed resistance to kick it in for me. I had my co-journeyer (someone who protects and takes care of us while in this altered state) apply pressure to my stomach that I could push against. That was the beginning of what was to become a rebirth experience, and eventually a state of bliss and non-dual realization through the rest of the process.

Once again, if you have the opportunity, this is a practice that can change your life.

Graphic by Gary; click to enlarge

A Challenge to Wake Up

So why am I writing about 9/11 conspiracy theories, not-so-secret plans for world domination by the military industrial complex, etc., etc.? All you have to do is look at history to thoroughly support "so what's new?" Things simply have not changed that much, and still the majority of us aren't conscious enough to know or care. We have our drugs of choice, happily supplied by those who would dominate us.

I left "religion" at twelve. I could not reconcile myth and science, and no one in my circle was talking about myth as allegory, only as fundamentalist truths with no room for questions, which I could not accept. I wandered for years as an atheist at first (my only option), and later as as agnostic. It wasn't until a few years ago that I became aware of something bigger than I. Call it "Spirit," the Universe, collective consciousness, or even God, as long as it isn't dualistic.

My own sense is that Spirit, The Universe (my preferred words of choice), is a collective consciousness that we're all connected to. Not just people, but a collective consciousness that encompasses the entire universe, which includes us. I believe (a belief that cannot be proven) that the entire Kosmos is conscious and that we're able to somehow tap into that with practice, attention, intention, and our own consciousness. If we're a part of the all, then that makes perfect sense.

We just have to learn to listen.

Believing that, I've been experimenting with Dialoging with Spirit: Conversations with God, if you will, different from petitionary prayer, and little irreverent. I think Spirit has a sense of humor. After all, could Spirit possibly embed a quality into creation that it didn't already posess? It's talking to Spirit, me, and everyone else at the same time. After all....how are we different?
I've had two recent experiences where I believe Spirit has directly spoken to me, something I would have laughed at years ago. One was when Anyaa and I were fretting about whether we'd get something we really wanted and it looked like it was going south on us. Through meditation and dialog, I asked the Universe (and me, and the collective unconscious) to give me a clue. That night I startled awake from a dream where I was told, "Gary, I only do the big things, not the little ones."

I immediately called and woke up Anyaa, 2700 miles away in North Carolina, to tell her of my dream. The message was clear to us both that if our desire did not pan out it was because there was a bigger picture yet to be revealed and that we should just relax into what was to be, and we did - and the worry was gone.

My second experience happened last Saturday, during a Shamanic Breathwork journey (see my earlier posts on this amazing process!), in the form of a vision. In that vision, my disembodied self flew into the Kosmos, hooked up with Spirit as light, and we danced across galaxies, solar systems, Magellan clouds, and universes....The Universe showed me an infinite number of worlds in an infinite universe, where conscious beings were struggling to survive. Some with consciousness just struggling out of the primordial mud, some far advanced from us, some at he same tipping point which determines our survival as a planet.

The Universe/Spirit explained to me that every planet that holds consciousness must go through exactly what we're going through, now. This time in every planet's development decides whether we are worthy of taking the next evolutionary step into a shared Universal Kosmic Consciousness, or whether we commit planetcide. It was further explained that many intelligences do not survive this time, and the planet is left to begin anew, because life, consciousness itself, always pushes on, always emerges, with, or without, us.

The choice is ours, and that's why I'm writing about this stuff. In good conscience (and good consciousness) I can stay silent no longer, I must speak out.

And I believe that if you're conscious, and not asleep, or drugged, that you must also speak out. We must create the disorienting dilemmas that cause people to question and wake up.

Hurry....there's not much time left.

image: www.es.com/.../digital_theater/shows/universe/

Last Day, Shamanic Breathwork Intensive

"It's a good day to die....."

That came up time and time again during this 8-day Shamanic Breathwork (TM) intensive I've just gone through. This process is all about death and rebirth.... Dying to ourselves and being reborn.... Dying to find salvation....Creating a major disorienting dilema, pushing through it, reintegrating, and being reborn with new awareness about who we are.

"How you doin', Gary?"

"Fine, thanks."

Of course, "fine" is just an acronym for "fucked-up, insecure, neurotic, and emotional."

I am fucked up, but I got a little better this week. because I know a couple of the places where I've been wounded, and even how I carry generations of the wounds of my family in my DNA. I'm going to be processing what happened to me this week for a while...maybe a long while, and it means consciously making changes in my life. It also means having much more compassion and love for those who have wounded me, and for my own responsibility around those wounds.

Even as I'm writing this, I feel it all coming up, and the processing continues.

Shamanic Breathwork (TM) breaks you down, and forces the surrender of ego. And it's only when we drop to our knees, only when we totally surrender, and only when we can willingly ask for help, that we can can be reborn anew. "Help" is the most profound prayer we can express.

I don't know that Shamanic Breathwork (TM) takes us vertically to the next level of consciousness, or if it heals us horizontally so we just get better at where we are, and I suppose it can do both.

What I do know is that in order to transform the world, we have to first transform ourselves. This is truly amazing, healing work.

After I get back, I'm going to start laying out this process in the AQAL framework so you can see how this fits he model. I've been doing that all week and have confirmed what I believed before I got here, and one of the reasons I did this intensive: In my opinion, this is a complete Integral practice/process, and I'll show you why, with charts.

SeattleIntegral is bringing Shamanic Breathwork to Seattle in June.

Image: www.dreamingheart.com

Day 3: Shamanic Breathwork Intensive, Breathing

Today we breathed.....wow....

I'm exhausted, feeling fuzzy, and definitely in an altered state of consciousness.

We started out this morning with the first half of the group being breathed along with the second half holding space for them, or co-journeying.

After setting the space and making sure everyone knew what to expect (sort of....you never know what's going to come up during a breathwork), our very capable facilitators began the first session of the day. My Love, Anyaa, went with this group and I was honored to hold space for her during her process.

It didn't take long for the breathwork to take effect: within minutes breathers began crying, wailing, screaming, laughing, you name it. For the next two hours, breathers were safely guided through all the stuff that comes up during a breathwork, the light and darkness of shadow, no difference. Imagine being in a room with about 10-12 people in a temporary state of psychosis!

One of the things about breathwork is that whatever needs to come up, comes up. Unlike traditional therapy, where you have to fight the consciousness and resistance of the client, breathwork goes right to the subconscious. No escape if you're serious about seeing what your shit is (golden or the regular variety).

In the afternoon, the second group, which I was a part of, breathed. Same routine, different music. Anyaa held space for me during my journey.

For the last two days I've been feeling my shadow stuff, my wounds, bubbling up to the surface, and I pretty much knew I wasn't going to be disappointed. I wasn't. It didn't take long before I was sobbing, and soon literally wailing in agony at my anger and pent up grief. Over the next two hours, I experienced and raged against years of old anger and grief, fought, hit (safely contained by co-journeyers, floor walkers, and facilitators....), cried, yelled, screamed, reclaimed my fierce masculine (where I had been giving away my power), and finally found myself in an embrace with Mother Gaia, making love to the entire universe and all its inhabitants, including myself.

After being brought back to our embodied selves, we proceeded to the art barn to draw our mandalas of our journey, and then to a delicious dinner of healthy comfort food.

Anyaa and I have talked about our journeys, and tomorrow we begin processing and re-integration, the death and rebirth process that brings us all the way through our journeys safely, and hopefully, more complete human beings.

Tomorrow: processing and re-integration.

"Integral" Shamanism

Last year, Bill, at Integral Options Cafe, wrote about what he called "Meta-Shamanism," where a "meta-shaman moves vertically along the whole Spiral, accessing the necessary energies, values, or traits of any given Meme as needed to solve the current situation. Within the Meme accessed, the meta-shaman is able to move within the horizontal or vertical orientation of that Meme as needed."

He goes on to say "The meta-shaman recognizes the entire Kosmos as a manifestation of Spirit, the source and destination of the manifest Universe. The gods, goddesses, and spirits humans have recognized throughout their history remain alive and valid within each of the vMemes that spawned them."

"Meta-shamans are capable of selecting (through a conscious process, or some intuitively - Gary), the Meme required at any given time. Within the selected Meme, whichever form of consciousness transformation is appropriate to that Meme is accessible, whether it's the trance state of the traditional shaman in Purple, or the nature mysticism of the Green Meme."

The danger with traditional Shamanic practices is, of course, the classic trap of of the pre/trans fallacy (as first identified by Wilber), in that it mistakes a previous level for an advanced level.

It is in this sense that I agree with Bill's well thought out analysis of "Meta," or even "integral," shamanism. I like his use of Spiral Dynamics as a values model to move through various stages of shamanism, and I want to try to take it a bit further, moving into Wilber's AQAL model, as well.

As Ken points out in Boomeritus, one of Shamanism's great contributions has been providing profound techniques of inducing altered states of a psychic and subtle nature, and that can be a path out of flatland. The trick seems to be to be able to take the altered-states technology of the shaman and fit them into more adequate interpretations. That shamanic STATES exist cannot be denied, but what STAGE do they get plugged into?

Whatever one's experience is of the shamanic altered-state practice is, like all state experiences, they will be interpreted first, by the altitude of the shaman, and individually interpreted, or reinterpreted, by the person experiencing the altered state based on their own development.

In this sense, Shamanism is no different than any other path that leads to altered states and transformation. "Integral" shamanism goes beyond traditional therapy and traditional shamanism: During this time of evolutionary unfoldment, an "integral" shaman may intuitively, or with purpose and intention, use all their tools, all the perspectives, including the the AQAL model, developmental levels, lines, states, and stages, recognizing that the people they are working with can be met where they are, and with a sense of using these skills, including shamanism, to have a sense of what needs to happen next, healing and opening paths to higher states of consciousness.

A Shamanic Breathwork Vision

Digital painting by Gary Stamper (click for a larger version)
I recently wrote about my first experience with Shamanic Breathwork. Since then, I 've had two more sessions, both ecstatic. In the second, I found myself supporting other friends who were also going through the process with me. In my third experience, a few days ago, I was 'breathed" again by Anyaa, who, among many other talents and gifts, is a Shamanic Breathwork Facilitator.

Ever since Ken Wilber recently asserted that our shadow is the number one block to our transformation, I've been working hard at examining my own shadows, and it appears to a never-ending quest, and I'm going to write about that in a future blog.

Still chasing my shadow, for this latest breathwork I set my intentions to try to visit the darker aspects of my subconscious. However, that is not what I experienced. This time I had what I can only interpret as a vision.

I'm assuming you've read my earlier blog on Shamanic Breathwork and at least have a basic understanding of it's origins with Stan Grof and Holotropic Breathwork, but I'd like to lay some groundwork of the process for you.

To begin, I was blindfolded and "cocooned" on the floor in warm blankets and pillows behind my head and knees. Anyaa then set the tone of the process, based on my intentions and her years of experience, in an almost prayer-like induction. Once the induction was completed, breathing and a musical journey through each of the Chakras began and lasted about 80 minutes. The combination of music and breathing creates a deeply altered state of consciosness in which whatever needs to arise, will.

For what seemed like a long time, nothing happened to me....then, for whatever reason, I began crying softly, not feeling sadness or joy, but just releasing. Under Anyaa's guidance, I was encouraged to "just let it go," and began sobbing and wailing, literally yelling, as I released tensions and pressures from my deepest being.

Eventually, I calmed and my father came into my consciousnessness, and I continued gently crying. Now, my father and I have always had a great relationship, and what I experienced was just pure, deep love for him. At 88, and so far healthy, I am blessed to still have him in my life, and there was just pure gratitude.

Then, the vision portion of my breathwork kicked in.

As the music continued to move me emotionally though the Chakras, I had a vision of standing in what I can only describe as a giant hall, open to the universe above, with streaming white light on both sides of me, travelling and moving toward a point in front of me, leading me to the end of the "hall." Also on both sides, were rows of spiritual beings (Shamans?) welcoming me on my journey through the lights. At the end of the hall, bathed in white light, stood Anyaa, in her Priestess robes, also welcoming me....and as I moved forward, she gently took my hand, and began guiding me to what I believe was a possible future. The digital painting I created at the top of this blog piece is almost exactly what I saw in this process. Anyaa eventually led me out of the breathwork and I just laid there for a while.

Later, while deconstructing my vision, I asked, "how much of what I saw was ego-induced?" Anyaa replied that, if you're truly immersed in the process, you can't manifest through your ego from those deep places: ego doesn't exist there.

Now I'm left with interpreting my vision, and while I won't share all of my interpretation, I can tell you that I believe a path was further opened for me, and that it was both a description of what is already happening in my life and a continuation and affirmation of what is possible for me. I believe it's time for me to start stepping out more as a teacher, sharing my gifts with others, and that the teachings I bring will be of service and value to others. I also believe that this is the right time for this to manifest, because it is manifesting in my life. Right now.

I'm going to continue doing the Shamanic Breathwork, and I'm producing a SeattleIntegral Shamanic Breathwork weekend event here in Seattle in June with Anyaa and her fellow teacher, Jeff Berger, who lives here in the northwest. I'm going to meet Jeff in April, when I travel to North Carolina to do an eight-day intensive on Shamanic Breathwork, as I'm considering becoming a facilitator.

Anyaa McAndrew is a licensed psychotherapist and resides in Western North Carolina. Her work is grounded in Transpersonal and Shamanic psychology as she walks the spiritual path of the Goddess. As an ordained Madonna Ministry Bishop and a Magdalene High Priestess, she has birthed the Mystery School of Life Force Energy, encompassing the Scorpio-Taurus Mysteries. Her Priestess Circles empower women to reclaim the lost soul essence of the priestess within.